September 2008

By: Kindah Mardam Bey (Ontario Correspondent - Canada)

TIFF, the acronym bound to be a one word recognition like Cannes, finished yesterday (September 13^th, 2008) and all the glitzy parties and film industry heavy weights will be enjoying their reflections of the passed ten days. Of course the fans of film will be equally treated with some fabulous memories and some previews as to what will be both potential blockbuster films for the fall & winter (Burn After Reading was an international hit before the festival was finished), and the up and coming Oscar contenders. 

Of course the Toronto Film Festival is known for more than highly publicized US films, it also allows Canadian film to take centre stage and welcomes an international mosaic of films that looks more varied than a United Nations session. One such film that captured the audience hearts, and the Cadillac People’s Choice Award was Slumdog Millionaire; a film directed by Brit Danny Boyle (Trainspotting, Shallow Grave) tells the story of a poor boy in the Indian slums and his rise to fortune. Slumdog Millionaire is a marked deviation from Boyle’s previous directing efforts, but packs a punch with passion. Boyle says the film is “a great underdog story,” so it is no small feat it ended up being top dog this year at TIFF.

In the Canadian category, isolation played a key role in both winning films, Marie-Helene Cousineau and Madeline Piujug Ivalu’s Before Tomorrow earned the CityTV award for Best Canadian First Feature Film "for its arresting beauty, its humanist, innovative storytelling and its artistic integrity in capturing the narrative of a people through an intimate tale." The film is based on Jorn Riel’s novel of the same name about an Inuit woman and her grandson as their survival skills are challenged when they become trapped on an island. The CityTV Award For Best Canadian Feature Film went to Rodrigue Jean’s Lost Song, which is about a couple and their baby moving to a remote area North of Montreal, where the Mother spirals into a depression. The jury said the film was “constantly surprising, profound, masterful, and devastatingly sad.” Perhaps not an exciting date movie, but definitely films like Lost Song are the substance of what film festivals are all about. Adoration received a respectful nod and citation in this category also.

On an international scale, the Prize of the International Critics for Discovery was handed to Derick Martini’s interesting film about community dynamic in Lymelife, which is set in the 1970s on Rhode Island, where a Lyme disease hits a suburban community. The story of Lymelife is seen through the eyes of fifteen year old Scott Bartlett (Rory Culkin). The Prize of the International Critics for Special Presentations went to Steve Jacob’s Disgrace. John Malkovich plays a professor who has an affair with one of his students, in which he is forced to resign and escape to his daughter’s farm. The family already on egg-shells is victim to a vicious attack.

Over 10 days, the Toronto International Film Festival shows 314 films from 64 countries, and 259 of them are features. Two-thirds are world premieres, and are both International and North American films. What made the 33^rd annual TIFF different? Well, a subsequent amount of pit-bull media seems to have been prevalent, which made the ardent film fest folks dismay at the high-intensity level. The Toronto Film Festival, often known for its laidback appeal for both celebs and film-goers had the scathing report from the L.A. Times that this comfortable festival had changed. Monica Corcoran of the L.A. Times writes “Not anymore. This year on the streets, sleek cheetahs like Keira Knightley and Brad Pitt were nowhere to be found -- let alone fed by hand. The big stars couldn't saunter around the city as they'd done in years past. And there were more Shrek-sized bodyguards than ever before. It's official: TIFF has become more circus than zoo, as Canadians catch up with us on the celebrity-worship hoopla.” 

Aside from the sad cheetahs, one other difference was to be had; the 33^rd annual Toronto film festival was, as event director Piers Handling put it "I think that it was the year of the performer…of the actor." It was true, as this year’s TIFF had a shear plethora of character-driven films for actors to stretch their capabilities, like Mickey Rouke in The Wrestler, Kristen Scott Thomas in I’ve Loved You So Long, and the riveting Anne Hathaway’s turn as a drug addict in Jonathon Demme’s Rachel Getting Married. Of course, some of the best performances were the big-time players heading directly to the smaller parts and quirkier roles, such as Brad Pitt in the Coen film Burn After Reading, and Canadian starlet Rachel McAdams in The Lucky Ones.

Slumdog Millionaire shows that the audience still has a cultured say at film festivals, and they don’t go for the films that necessarily have the biggest hype and biggest names attached. When making a film, Spielberg says he goes straight for that section “below the chin and above the gut” and Slumdog Millionaire managed to do just that, and aimed for the heart.